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  <title>MediaGoblin 0.3.1: A Whole New Look</title>
  <meta name="date" content="2012-08-24 12:00" />
  <meta name="author" content="Deb Nicholson" />
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<p class="centered">
  <img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_banner.png"
       alt="MediaGoblin 0.3.1: A Whole New Look banner" />
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<p>Welcome to "A Whole New Look!" I know what you were told as a kid,
that looks don't matter. And when it comes to figuring out who your
friends are or taking the SAT's that's absolutely correct. But I'm
here to tell you that when it comes to software, looks count! Really!
So let's take a look at 0.3.1, shall we?</p>

<p>The most exciting news is that we're supporting theming now, which
means you can make your MediaGoblin instance look any way you want.
The dark theme is still default, but we now also package mediagoblin
with this lovely light theme called "airy":</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_airy_theme_userpage.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_airy_theme_userpage-scaled.png"
           alt="The airy theme in a user gallery" /></a>
</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_airy_theme_singlemedia.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_airy_theme_singlemedia-scaled.png"
           alt="The airy theme focused on a single image" /></a>
</p>

<p>Or you could even build your own!  DIY all the way.  For example,
<a href="http://chimo.chromic.org/">Chimo</a> has this for
<a href="http://media.chromic.org/">his MediaGoblin instance</a>
(which <a href="https://github.com/chimo/Mediagoblin-Theme">you can
use or borrow from!</a>):</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_chimo_gallery.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_chimo_gallery-scaled.png"
           alt="Chimo's theme, gallery" /></a>
</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_chimo_individual.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_chimo_individual-scaled.png"
           alt="Chimo's theme, individual image" /></a>
</p>

<p>We can't wait to see what you come up with!  Whether you're looking
to build a new theme or build your own, you should check out our
<a href="http://docs.mediagoblin.org/siteadmin/theming.html">theming
documentation!</a></p>

<p>Also, right up there on the list of exciting new features is the
fact that we're now supporting plugins. Whoo! Plugins! This has been
our summer project. Some folks watch birds or bake pies; we built a
plugin system. (Some of us might've also baked pies, come to think of
it...)  Anyway, the first order of business is to switch some of our
existing internal stuff to plugin form.  (We have quite a few things
we'd like to get switched over to plugins, such as openstreetmap
support... if you're interested in helping, please do
<a href="http://mediagoblin.org/pages/join.html">contact us</a>!)</p>

<p>For practice, we've already written a
<a href="http://docs.mediagoblin.org/plugindocs/flatpagesfile.html">flatpages
plugin</a>. If you want an about page or a Terms of Service page
without any media, you can easily build one to match your chosen
theme.</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_flatpages.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_flatpages-scaled.png"
           alt="Example use of flatpages with a custom page" /></a>
</p>

<p>Some plugins we think it would be cool to see built; spam detection
for comments (maybe via captchas or a hook-up to
<a href="https://spamicity.info/">Spamicity</a>/<a href="https://github.com/evanp/activityspam">ActivitySpam</a>),
support for various types of authentication like OpenID, and user
quotas to keep the traffic at a manageable level on your instance. Or
blow our minds and write something we never even thought of. Want to
get started right now? <a href="http://docs.mediagoblin.org/siteadmin/plugins.html">Plugin docs are here</a>.</p>

<p>We are all about communication. We know you like to know what's up,
so we've added email notifications for comments, improved the
documentation for installing different media types:
http://docs.mediagoblin.org/siteadmin/media-types.html and made it
easier for you to tell how far along your media is in the processing
phase, aka "are we there yet?"</p>

<p class="blog_image">
  <a href="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_processing_panel.png"
     ><img src="/blog_images/mediagoblin_0.3.1_processing_panel-scaled.png"
           alt="Processsing panel showing off uploads done and in progress" /></a>
</p>

<p>We also fixed a bunch of bugs, improved testing and fixed some
temporary space problems. Users will be seeing fewer errors and if
you're writing code for us, you've got lovely new unit tests making it
easier than ever to vet your new code.</p>

<p>Thanks to everyone who gave us their time this summer: Aleksej
Serdjukov, Brett Smith, Christopher Allan Webber, Deb Nicholson, Derek
Moore, Elrond of Samba TNG, Jakob Kramer, Jef van Schendel, Joar
Wandborg, Jorge Araya Navarro, Will Kahn-Greene.  We really, really
can't do it without you.</p>

<p>MediaGobin will continue to update it's appearance and we promise
to keep you in the loop. Want to help us with user experiene or write
a plugin or translation? Swing on by! We're nearly always in
#mediagoblin on freenode.net Or you
can <a href="http://lists.mediagoblin.org/listinfo/devel">join the
mailing list</a> or even send us email us at
press@mediagoblin.org.</p>
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